The Sophisticate

The next day, people keep dying.
He sees some, hears others.
The American doctors
are overwhelmed; he hears them repeatedly
begging Division for supplies.
Often, supplies would make no difference.
In some blocks, prisoners have captured
a guard. It must be strange
for those men, to be beaten, stifled,
strangled by skeletal hands. In other blocks
American soldiers themselves kill guards,
condoned by sergeants, officers briefly
looking the other way.
Eisenhower visits
accompanied by other generals;
he sharply curtails Patton’s wisecracks.
Lying beside a triage tent, the prisoner
knows what if not who these men are.
He is fed, told to eat slowly.
He observes the soldiers, in whom horror
has been replaced by numb rage.
It isn’t universal; some faces show nothing, some …
He sees some Jews, no Negroes.
His English, though rusty, is good:
he listens for words and tones.
He deliberates whether to sink into
(it would be more relaxing) the surrounding
feeling towards the Americans:
not love, beyond love; a belief
that human beings have again appeared and are good.